1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to a liquid ejecting apparatus which is provided with a cartridge holder attaching section on which a plurality of cartridge holders for holding a cartridge storing liquid such as ink are attached.
2. Related Art
In related art, as a typical example of a liquid ejecting apparatus, an ink jet recording apparatus having a recording head that performs printing by discharging ink droplets to a recording media from nozzles has been widely used.
The recording apparatus is provided with a carriage and a recording head loaded on the carriage and performs printing on the recording media by discharging the ink droplets from the nozzles formed on the recording head while shifting the carriage relative to the recording media.
There is widely used a recording apparatus having a plurality of cartridge holders provided therein for housing and holding a plurality of ink cartridges storing print ink (for example, see JP-A-2006-116793).
The ink cartridges may house an ink pack storing the ink in a cartridge case. Pressurization air is applied into the cartridge case and thus, the ink pack is placed under pressure, whereby the ink is ejected from an ejection member (an ink supply needle) and is supplied to the recording head.
For example, as shown in FIG. 16, cartridge holders 100 housing the ink cartridges have a substantially rectangular thin packing body 101 and an ink cartridge housing space housing the ink cartridges therein. In the cartridge holders 100 shown in FIG. 16, a plurality of (here, for example, three packing bodies) packing bodies 101 each have one side surface opened and are laminated and mounted with a side plate 102 to form three cartridge housing spaces. Openings 103 for attaching and detaching the ink cartridges are provided on a front surface (a right inner side surface in FIG. 16) of each cartridge holder 100. On rear walls 104 of the cartridge holders 100, there are provided holding portions 105 for holding air supply members for introducing air in the ink cartridges or holes 106 holding the ink supply needle for emitting the ink from the ink cartridges.
However, as shown in FIG. 17, a plurality of cartridge holders 100 shown in FIG. 16 are laminated and integrally used so as to house ink cartridges each storing ink of different colors and have the wrong insertion prevention structure for allowing only ink cartridges of predetermined colors to be mounted for each cartridge holder 100. Accordingly, mutual attaching positions of the cartridge holders 100 are also predetermined so as to supply ink of a correct color to a recording head of a recording apparatus. As a result, as shown in FIG. 16, locking claws 107 and locking concave portions 108 are provided at different positions of each of the cartridge holders 100 so as not to attach the cartridge holders 100 in an order other than a proper lamination order.
In a bottom cartridge holder 100 shown in each of FIGS. 16 and 17, a locking claw 107A for locking the cartridge holder 100 above the bottom cartridge holder 100 (a second step from the downside) is provided, and in a second-step cartridge holder 100, a locking concave portion 108B with which only the bottom locking claw 107A can engage is provided. In the second-step cartridge holder 100, a locking claw 107B for locking a third-step cartridge holder 100 is provided, and in the third-step cartridge holder 100, a locking concave portion 108C with which only the second-step locking claw 107B can engage is provided.
Similarly, in the third-step cartridge holder 100, the locking claw 107C for locking the third-step cartridge holder 100 is provided, and a locking concave portion 108D with which only the third-step locking claw 107C can lock is provided. A plurality of cartridge holders in a state shown in FIG. 17 are mounted and used integrally with a flow channel unit having ink flow channels.
By this configuration, the cartridge holders 100 can be relatively attached on and detached from each other only in a vertical direction. As a result, as shown in FIG. 17, assuming that a cartridge holder 100 in the middle (in a center) of a plurality of integrated cartridge holders 100 breaks down, it is difficult to directly take out only the broken cartridge holder 100.
Assuming that one cartridge holder is removed, complicated steps for removing all cartridge holders from the flow channel unit on which the plurality of cartridge holders are attached and disassembling them into individual cartridge holders are required, which is inconvenient.